Rich without taxes, yet in payment just;
So honest, that he hardly could diftrust;
His active foul from labours ne'er did cease,
Valiant in war, and vigilant in peace;
Studious with traffick to enrich the land;
Strong to protect, and fkilful to command;
Liberal and fplendid, yet without excefs;
Prone to relieve, unwilling to diftress ;
In fum, how godlike muft his nature be,
Whofe only fault was too much piety!
This king remov'd, th' affembled states thought fit
That Tarquin in the vacant throne should fit;
Voted him regent in their fenate-house,
And with an empty name endow'd his spouse,
The elder Tullia, who, fome authors feign,
Drove o'er her father's corpfe a rumbling wain :
But the more guilty numerous wains did drive
To crush her father and her king alive;
And in remembrance of his haften'd fall,
Refolv'd to inftitute a weekly ball.
The jolly glutton grew in bulk and chin,
Feafted on rapine, and enjoy'd her fin;
With luxury fhe did weak reafon force,
Debauch'd good-nature, and cram'd down remorse;
Yet when the drank cold tea in liberal fups,
The fobbing dame was maudling in her cups.
But brutal Tarquin never did relent,
Too hard to melt, too wicked to repent;
Cruel in deeds, more merciless in will,
And bleft with natural delight in ill.
From a wife guardian he receiv'd his doom
To walk the Change, and not to govern Rome.
He fwore his native honours to difown,
And did by perjury afcend the throne.
Oh! had that oath his fwelling pride represt,
Rome had been then with peace and plenty bleft.
But Tarquin, guided by destructive fate,
The country wafted, and embroil'd the ftate,
Transported to their foes the Roman pelf,
And by their ruin hop'd to fave himself.
Innumerable woes opprefs'd the land,
When it fubmitted to his curs'd command.
So just was heaven, that 'twas hard to tell,
Whether its guilt or loffes did excell.
Men that renounc'd their God for dearer trade,
Were then the guardians of religion made.
Rebels were fainted, foreigners did reign,
Outlaws return'd, preferment to obtain,
With frogs, and toads, and all their croaking train.
No native knew their features nor their birth,
They feem'd the greafy offspring of the earth.
The trade was funk, the fleet and army fpent;
Devouring taxes fwallow'd leffer rent;
Taxes impos'd by no authority;
Each lewd collection was a robbery.
Bold felf-creating men did ftatutes draw,
Skill'd to establish villainy by law;
Fanatic drivers, whofe unjust careers
Produc'd new ills exceeding former fears.
Yet authors here except a faithful band,
Which the prevailing faction did withstand;
And fome, who bravely ftood in the defence
Of baffled justice and their exil'd prince.
Thefe fhine to after-times, each facred name
Stands ftill recorded in the rolls of fame.
WHEN lawless men their neighbours difpoffefs,
The tenants they extirpate or opprefs;
And make rude havock in the fruitful foil,
Which the right owners plough'd with careful toil.
The fame proportion does in kingdoms hold,
A new prince breaks the fences of the old!
And will o'er carcafes and deferts reign,
Unless the land its rightful lord regain.
He gripes the faithlefs owners of the place,
And buys a foreign army to deface
The fear'd and hated remnant of their race.
He ftarves their forces, and obftructs their trade;
Vaft fums are given, and yet no native paid.
The church itself he labours to affail,
And keeps fit tools to break the facred pale.
Of those let him the guilty roll commence,
Who has betray'd a mafter and a prince;
A man, feditious, lewd, and impudent;
An engine always mifchievously bent;
One who from all the bands of duty fwerves;
No tye can hold but that which he deserves ;
VOL. I.
Dear catamite! who rules alone the state,
'While monarch dozes on his unpropt height,
Silent, yet thoughtless, and fecure of fate.
Could you but fee the fulfome hero led
By loathing vaffals to his noble bed!
In flannen robes the coughing ghost does walk,
And his mouth moates like cleaner breech of hawk,
Corruption, fpringing from his canker'd breast,
Furs up the channel, and disturbs his reft.
With head propt up the bolster'd engine lies
If pillow flip afide, the monarch dies.
THE PREFAC E.
A Poem with fo bold a title, and a name prefixed
from which the handling of fo ferious a subject would not be expected, may reasonably oblige the author to say somewhat in defence, both of himself and of his undertaking. In the first place, if it be objected to me, that, being a layman, I ought not to have concerned myself with fpeculations, which belong to the profeffion of divinity; I could answer, that perhaps laymen, with equal advantages of parts and knowledge, are not the most incompetent judges of facred things; but, in the due sense of my own weakness and want of learning, I plead not this: I pretend not to make myself a judge of faith in others, but only to make a confesfion of my own. I lay no unhallowed hand upon the ark, but wait on it with the reverence that becomes me at a distance. In the next place I will ingenuously confefs, that the helps I have used in this fmall treatise, were many of them taken from the works of our own reverend divines of the church of England; fo that the weapons with which I combat irreligion, are already confecrated; though I fuppofe they may be taken down
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